


decedere

by indomiiac (aloeveratrine)



Series: The Unfortunate Case of an Insomniac [1]
Category: DuckTales (Cartoon 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Feels, Drabble, Episode: s01e22 The Last Crash of the Sunchaser!, Gen, Insomniac Scrooge McDuck, it’s that sunchaser scene but slightly different
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-26
Updated: 2019-09-25
Packaged: 2020-09-27 07:16:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,021
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20403808
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aloeveratrine/pseuds/indomiiac
Summary: Things that were said that can’t be taken back. Because now, we’re only falling apart.





	1. my heart is not for you to hear

** _‘So you’re the reason our mom is gone.’_ **

It only took a sentence, a few seconds, a wake up call from a child he considered kin to make Scrooge McDuck’s life fall apart. A reminder of the one thing he tried to bury and deny, only for it crawl back from its grave to strangle him.

** _‘You built her a crazy dangerous super rocket!’_ **

Why? Why did this have to happen? There was nothing he could’ve said that could make this better. They really fucking think that he didn’t do enough? Was he just that selfish in their eyes? He did everything he could to get their mother back yet why couldn’t he speak up?

** _‘Then you encouraged her to keep flying through a cosmic storm! You could’ve called her down- there were too many variables!’_ **

His nephews, the children that the lost rocketeer left behind for a reckless venture, ones reunited with him and rekindled his ravenous appetite for the thrill of adventure, had his world flipped upside down in one moment like the city of Atlantis. As if he was back in the beginning, the downfall of his only life support that pulled him out of the inescapable seas of grief finally failing him, like a rope was about to snap as he held tighter and tighter onto it. The round, young furious eyes of his kin stung him with nothing but resentment, disappointment, and most of all, betrayal.

** _‘You’re the richest duck in the world! Why didn’t you send more ships to look for her?’_ **

This is how they repay him?

“**I spared no expense!**” bitterly, Scrooge huffed, managed to get something out of his ragged lungs, every syllable was dangerously intoxicating.

They argued, all turned against him with baseless assumptions that only infuriated him even more.

Enmity started to writhe into the miser’s heart, rendering him defenseless. He shouldn’t have fucking said anything. He shouldn’t have done anything! Scrooge McDuck shouldn’t have even gone to these damn adventures even with the kids!

Like a wounded animal backed into a corner, he was at the edge of spilling his venomous, hurtful thoughts into real words. It doesn’t matter. All of it didn’t matter anymore. Countless of his hopes just shattered, as his mind got noisier and noisier with every second that it took. Then… Everything went silent in his head, leaving only static and lost empathy. That static rang, deafening everyone’s voices. It was only then that he truly saw it.

Why did the boys look at him with such distrust? To think that they would ever look at him like that. It started to come back. The heaviness of his thoughts. He ran from it constantly these past ten years since that damn rocket launched. _ No, it wasn’t his fault _, he convinced himself repeatedly. Over and over and over- putting him in an infinite loop, the torture lasting an eternity.

His heart ached more and more, finally reaching a conclusion that built up since his niece was lost to the endless void of the sea of stars. One that he invalidated a long, long time ago.

** _‘.... Gifting an experimental to a mother of three was clearly a terrible idea!”_ **

Who in the blazes was he kidding? Who was he lying to? That’s right, himself.

**It was all his fault.**

“Then leave!” Scrooge screamed, _ No- Wait. Stop. Why can’t he just fucking stop himself, _“If I really am the person ye think I am now, then there’s no use staying with me, is there?”

“FINE!” Dewey yelled back.

“After everything I do for you,” _ No. No- No— STOP, “ _YOU’RE ALL NOTHING BUT TROUBLE.”

As the sun set, the scarlet-colored sky layered with its orange and yellow splashes; it transitioned into the night. The plane that held them, always chasing the sun, crashed harder than ever before. The wings broke, creaking and clashing metal mechanisms, its engine roared one last time before it was silenced forever.

This was the last crash of the Sunchaser.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ok SO HERE’s the ThInG,, THIS was supposed to be a short drabble but it feels like i can still add on to so, i’m leaving this as a multi chapter one!! so yeah,,


	2. a fallen kingdom for a lonesome king

Like every other crash, the McDuck family survived. Scrooge knocked the door furiously. He couldn’t even feel the pain on his shoulder as he slammed his body onto it recklessly. The miser was not going to stay here in this metal contraption, where he’s going to say things he can’t take back, not to them, not in this state, n _ ot anymore _ . Please, for the love of gold, they have to be  ** _out of his sight._ **

Scrooge growled, taking out his golden flip phone. His hand trembled, but he didn’t let it control him this time. He speaks into the phone, controlled but you can still tell there was still anger in his voice. Ice cold. He ordered a chopper to rescue them as soon as possible. The sunchaser would be retrieved and repaired afterwards. He doesn’t care if it’s a needless expense; just wants them out of here. 

The chopper did come for his family as he commanded. Scrooge didn’t speak during the entire trip; In fact, he wasn’t even there at all. They all hopped out after it landed within his property as the boys dashed towards the house boat furiously. Webby and her grandmother went into their quarters, Scrooge followed after Launchpad did. 

Calm and collected— the miser made it to his study.  _ Ok, everything is fine.  _ He reached to his desk, leaning on to it as his blood boiled. Everything was perfectly fine. Oh yelling at your family who accused you of being the reason why your beloved niece was gone? Accusing him that he didn't do anything to get her back? Everything went swimmingly. They’re moving out anyway. They don’t care and they’ve made that clear. I don’t care about what they think.  _ I don’t care. I just don’t— _

He shouldn’t have let his family in. He should’ve refused to let them back into his life. He fucking knew it.

They were going to throw him under the bus all over again. His family, talking about things they didn’t understand— This. It was this. This was Hortense and Matilda all over again. This was Donald all over again. This was Goldie all over again.

“McDuck,” Beakley called to him from his behind.

“Take your vacation days, 22, and go away.”

“Oh, stop being so hard-headed,” the old english lady remarked about his behavior.

_ Oh, Not you too. _ “I’m… hard-headed?” 

“ **I’m** hard-headed?!” Scrooge raised his voice at his partner, who’s been with him ever since the Spear of Selene, “If it weren’t for ye, this could’ve never happened today.”

“Oh.. So I’m  _ the one to blame _ ?” the maid tried to not lose her composure on her best friend, “I was only looking out for you, Sir. How is it my fault?”

“Aye,  ** _SURE_ ** ! Yer looking out fer me,” he chuckled grimly, “Ye distracted me from getting the engine started when I could do it myself? Look at what good it did that!”

“You’re angry at your world, and angry at your family because your bloody ego can’t take it.”

“Ye think this is about my  ** _pride_ ** ?!”

“It always is!” Beakley snapped at him.

_ I thought she knew me better than that. _

“You can’t do everything by yourself, McDuck.

“...Yes, I can!” He huffed. 

“No, You can’t! You just refuse any help that’s offered to you, because you can’t be helpless in the eyes of everyone else but yourself. Please just—“

“Ah’m not the problem here, Bentina,” stubbornly, the old miser gritted his teeth, “Ah could’ve handled it all by myself.”

“...That’s what you said 10 years ago and look what happened.” Beakley hit him in the parts of his heart where it hurt the most. 

“...” Scrooge widened his eyes to his bodyguard, feeling betrayed._ Not her too._ _Why is everything falling apart._

_ He trusted her— _ “ ** _Leave_ ** .”

“Scrooge.” Beakley pleaded.

“Leave me alone, and take Webbigail with you. Ah donnae need you. Ah donnae need anyone.”

“... Fine,” Beakley stepped back from the miser, quickly approaching the doorway, then she turned to speak one last time, “Congratulations, McDuck. You pushed your family, and everyone who cared about you away  _ again _ . I hope you’re happy.”

The old maid closed the door, slamming it even.

It wasn’t long enough until Scrooge knocked everything that was on top of his desk. The work he brought home that week, reports, pens, desk supplies, frames that even held his family pictures, even his treasures. He buried his fists into the wooden boards of the desk, bruising his own knuckles— spilling and leaking blood. The miser couldn’t even feel the pain as he smashed the furniture, tearing up the books. 

The scotsman screamed, and screamed and he didn’t even hear it. He chose not to listen to it. The elderly adventurer threw himself recklessly, hurting himself in every blow, until there was nothing left. He demolished everything in his office. Leaving only devastation— a long raging, storm that had been coming for a very long time.

Scrooge reached for his neck, forcibly taking the piece of jewelry given by the boys as a gift pinned on his collar. It gleamed a familiar shine, highlighting its fool’s gold trim. It was almost the same birthday gift… Della and Donald gave him decades ago. Just a different color.

His fingers trembled; couldn’t possibly throw this against a wall, not after the previous one shattered. He lowered his hand, and took it back as he held onto the brooch like it was his life. A wave of exhaustion took him, resulting him to lose his balance.

Was it over? Staring at his bloody knuckles blankly; his back fell on the door. Leaning, and dragging himself down as he sat.

He’s so… tired.

He’s been tired for a long time.

_ It’s so difficult to breathe. _

A little knock came from the door, a tiny duckling’s voice slipped through. It whispered from the door, “Unca Scrooge?”

_ Webby?  _ His heart throbbed achingly. She was the last person he wanted to hear from. He couldn’t handle to even see her right now. No answer was given to the child on the other side of the door. 

“Granny told me we’re going away for awhile… I just wanted to check on you before we go,” the little girl stated, seeing the Scrooge’s shadow moving down there.

“...”

“...I’m sorry for what I said to you back there, and for everything that happened. We shouldn’t have yelled at you like… like that.”

“...” Still no response.

“Was… Was this why you’ve been… sad all the time before the boys came along? And your… insomnia?”

The silence answered the question.

“Unca Scrooge?” Webby tried opening the door a little bit and- Scrooge pushed back with what little strength he had left. He wasn’t ready to let anyone in or see him like this.

“Webbigail.”  _ He called her Webbigail,  _ his voice raspy from his screaming from a while ago, “Please… go with yer Granny, alright?”

“Are you going to be okay?” she asked in concern.

_ I haven’t been okay for a long, long time—  _ “Aye. Dinna fash, lass.”

...‘You’ll be happy in no time,’ was a lie that Scrooge had told her when she was younger, it sprung into her head, hoping she would never hear it again after his nephews got into the picture. 

She was wrong.

“I’m… sorry I didn’t understand sooner…”

“Lass…”

“Mr. McDuck,” a heartache and sorrow carried her words, as that way of addressing the old miser left her beak rusty, “ Please… take care of yourself.”

Scrooge heard her footsteps fading away and silence claimed the hallway again. 

The key to the study’s hidden room on the floor shined, inviting him to take it. He reached for it and it was then that he let himself to crumble quietly. The red chair, the fireplace, the covered paintings, the dust that collected over the years.

There was no one left in his fallen kingdom, and he reigned as the king of isolation, sitting on a throne that stood taller than him. No one was there to love him and no one was there to hurt him. There was no one.

No one but himself.

Scrooge McDuck was happy.


End file.
